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America has always like to conflate circus freak shows and politicians. Although I don't have examples ready, eighteenth century American politics are full of dubious candidates. I'll wait to see what kind of governator Arnie is. Who knows? Perhaps he'll do an ok job. I'll be amazed if the Republican war on taxes (while spending gobs of money on the military and spook projects) has any positive long-term benefit for the country as a whole. Somehow, it just seems petty and self-serving.

The concept is simple: cutting taxes puts more money in the hands of people which helps businesses grow which creates more tax revenue. You can end up with the same amount of increased revenue and help taxpayers at the same time.

It has worked in the past. It worked under JFK, and it worked under Reagan. Will it work again? Time will tell, but to imply it doesn't make sense is to ignore cases where it's actually worked as planned.

I'm not an economist, but some economists claim that supply-side has never been a real economic theory with any evidence for it, just a political platform. This article [korpios.org] describes how supply-side economists have no support from academia. And currently Princeton economist Paul Krugman [pkarchive.org] has devoted many of his NYTimes columns to debunking the idea.

Also -- I've never heard that JFK was a supply-sider before.

But you're one of the smarter conservatives I know, and I'd like to hear the other side. The rebuttals

I can't talk much about it now, I am on vacation, but realize two things: 1. academia is not interesting to me, as it often ignores practical application and evidence, and 2. Krugman is at least as "politically slanted" as the National Review is.

As to Kennedy being a "supply sider," I wouldn't say that in today's terms, but look into the things he said about cutting the top tax rate (then up around 80 or 90 percent... yes, really) and look at the result of slashing it. And "Reaganomics" DID help bring the economy back, though I wish it had not been accompanied by huge amounts of deficit spending (same problem I have with President Bush, now).